| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/8/2008 4:44:54 PM | It is kind of a response to women in their 30's with no children. I got married at 33 thinking I wasn't going to have kids because my wife was tied. I knew this going in and I was ok with it because when I first met her I was 29 and really didn't want kids.
Now I'm 38 and my wife and I are separated with no shot of getting back together again. She is with someone else andI'm alone with my thoughts of why I ended it with her....I now want kids. I feel guilty for ending my marriage for the want of children, Ive been told it is selfish on my part to end my marriage, but I also know that my brother and myself have mo children and want to keep the family name going.
I feel rotten for this and have had bouts of depression ever since my wife left. I guess what I'm trying to find is somre kind of sympathy for my position even though i really feel I dont deserve it. Your comments would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, Clay | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/8/2008 4:49:39 PM | People grow apart for many reasons. You and your wife grew apart for the children reason. No need to feel guilt.
Asking her to leave may have been a not so nice thing to do when it was you who changed your mind about your wants.
But, then again...she's already moved on?
I'm a bit confused, I guess. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/8/2008 5:15:48 PM | | Nah thats my fault, I failed to mention that we also were fighting on a regular basis, mainly about her kids. She has 3 from a previous relationship and one of the main tensions we had was her not letting me discipline kids. I mean if she wanted me to be her children's step father, I could not be a partial step father, it was all the way or not at all. She also would undermine my authority by not punishing the kids for things I felt they needed to be punished for. It was a major source of tension to me and for whatever reason, she said she would never change and that was that. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/8/2008 11:04:03 PM | | She seemed to move on with ease so she is not feeling as guity as you. If you felt you made a mistake,like many you made in your life I am sure then move on as she did. If you really want this then really dont look for it. You will amazed on how things fall in your lap when you dont look. Wish her well and do not look back. Thought are funny.They are blueprints of yourself transcribed into memories to put you in a state of conscience. That being said,take them for what they are good or bad and do not let them control your life. I guess this is the best advice I can give. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/8/2008 11:10:31 PM | | To add on this, first and foremost if she has 3 kids by age 29 thats a red flag right there. Why you only 29 years old and having three kids? So hate to say that is your fault number one. Number two, you cant blame her not wanting to have kids because 3 she got her hands full. Number three,you are the man of the house wheather of not you are their father you are an adult. Respect should be there and if she cant understand that then you better off leaving her. Listen for every pot there is a lid. you will find your match and hope for the best for you. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/9/2008 8:00:25 AM | No thats wrong Rack, she was 33 when I met her and had 3 kids prior to meeting me. It was her decision to get her tubes tied and at the time i was ok with it. I was 29 and had and still have no children. Her ex, the one before me, told her not to get her tubes tied for the sake of her finding another man who would want kids. She was convinced she was going to be with him forever and got the tubes tied, even though he was cheating on her for the last few years of the relationship.
I still love her, but obviously, she felt compelled to seek out someone she knew beforebut never had a relationship with. She started seeing him the day after Christmas and did not find out about it until February, we were separated at the time, I guess I wasn't expecting her to rebound so quickly. Here I am 4 months later and still single. Im not jealous or anything, just a little miffed I guess. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/9/2008 9:14:45 AM | I am 33 and I have no children. Hurrah! I don't have crotchfruit that I need to find baby sitting for and worry about potential conflicts with any partners and these ungrateful crotchnuggets. Hurrah!
Ooh..and I get to travel lots and spend money on ME.
Besides, babies are stupid. They don't know anything. And you got to feed them like at least once a day. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/9/2008 3:35:32 PM | Do not feel guilty for anything. You are feeling lonely right now and do want to have kids.....everyone has a right to change their mind. And from what you wrote, it appears that even if you stayed together things would not have really changed between you and your ex......so it is time to look ahead and take care of yourself. You are young enough to find someone else and still have children. It is not uncommon for men in their 40's to have children.......and you just might find the woman that is truly right for you!
I can understand your dilemma though. Have always felt that I would be a mother, but at age 37 years old I really haven't had the opportunity. Was married for two years, but for many reasons we decided it not best to have kids........and at the time it was the right thing. However, now I am regretting not having kids and as I age it is getting more difficult to have them. I could go to a sperm bank, but as a teacher and an aunt, I know how difficult it would be to raise a child alone. I feel I would be selfish if I went out and did it........and shouldn't I be looking out for my child? Shouldn't they be first and foremost in my mind? So needless to say I don't have any kids and it doesn't look like any on the horizon. However, I agree with another post.....I get to spend all my money on me and I can travel! (Yeah, I know it doesn't really make you happy to think that way) | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/9/2008 8:18:25 PM | I am 48 and no children. It isn't that I didn't want them. First wife found out she could not, and the second was a DES baby and developed Cancer after her two sons were born.
Do I miss not having any? Sometimes, but I figure there are enough homeless / orphaned kids in the world without adding to the population. Adoption is always an option.
I would say that if you wanted kids just to carry on the family name is a little old fashioned for today. You have to want them, love them and nurture them, not just have them for a purpose. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/9/2008 8:28:12 PM | | Hind sight is always 20/20. You can't change the past. All you can change is your way of thinking and your actions. Move on and be happy. Find the woman you were meant to have children with! | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/9/2008 10:27:08 PM | Smacks a brother on the side of the head:
YOU'VE WON. An older man can easily attract a younger female of child rearing qualities, and trust another old ****er, Thats exactly what I did. Found a nice farm girl, 10 years younger, good family, family oriented, and happy as hell.
I can't possibly tell you how good your position is until you heal over the next year. Best advice: Get a small town escort (cheap) every 2 weeks until your head is clear.
Good luck. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/10/2008 3:53:16 PM | I'm 34 and at this point...I don't think I want kids. Statistics say it costs 250,000 dollars per kid to raise and educate. I'm thinking....Retirement is a couple decades away potentially..That would totally knock that out of the picture. Having kids is a 20'something thing in my opinion.
JJ | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/10/2008 4:12:49 PM | I did have to laugh at the comments from one person about how 3 kids at the age of 29 was a red flag.
Over here in the UK we have a major teenage pregnancy problem. It is not uncommon to find girls of 19 with 3 kids, and all with different fathers too.
Now I'm not knocking people who have a lot of kids, I'd love a big family. And sometimes your life doesn't always work out the way you planned and you will be married several times with kids from each marriage.
However, the people I am mentioning probably don't even know who the father is as they were so drunk they can't remember.
Check the UK news, there is a major criminal case going on right now about a woman who it appears faked the disappearance of her child. She has 7 kids from 5 different Fathers. And her latest boyfriend has just been arrested for having kiddy porn on his computer!!!!! | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/10/2008 4:36:16 PM | | I do not know the exact saying, but do not feel guilty or regret it, because at one time it was exactly what you wanted. You wanted her and all the "baggage" that she came with. You grew apart and grew into a new person, with the decision on wanting kids. Do not be in a rush, you are golden to many women out there that want to start a family and are looking for someone without the "baggage." Don't blame yourself or her. Grow emotionally over the next year and move on when you are ready. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/10/2008 6:14:01 PM | | Just give it time. As a 36 year old, yeah it would be nice to have kids but only with someone that's capable of taking on the responsibility. Obviously, I haven't found her yet. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/11/2008 10:08:00 AM | | This is not entirely a personal issue. There's a huge structural component. It's part of the growing culture of singleness. For example, the percentage of women reaching menopause childless has doubled in the last generation or two, from about 20% to about 40%; of those who are having children, an increasing number are of the sort TallGraham mentions. Lots of men want nothing to do with these latter sorts of goings-on. All these things women are doing or not doing cannot not have an effect on men, even if it's partly caused by choices men are making (or not making), too, since we're all in this together. So it's worth pointing out that a man saying to himself "I'd like to have kids" is of a wholly different sort than him saying "I'd like to have a 50-inch plasma TV". Not having kids doesn't really mean very much without a whole lot of additional information, even if some might wish for some sort of real simple indicator. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/11/2008 3:13:45 PM | Reflect and learn from the past, not dwell.
I am 31 with no children so far, but do eventually want them. My thing is simply that I haven't met the woman that I want to have children with yet. It isn't a slight on the women that I've been in relationships with, rather it was simply something that never evolved into the relationships. If I have them, great, if not, it wasn't meant to be.
Time reveals all, so man up and move on. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/11/2008 3:51:53 PM | | It sounds like your marriage broke up over parenting more than anything else. If you had felt more fulfilled by your role as a father to your stepkids, maybe it wouldn't be so important to you to leave your wife and find one to have kids with you. The thing about continuing the family name is a pretty bad reason to bring an innocent child into this world of suffering. Think about the way things are going, global warming, over-population, equalization of wages across the planet which means significant declines in western standard of living, increased terrorism, increased nuclear threat as Iran and North Korea get in the game, and so on. If you really need someone to raise, try adopting a kid who has already been sentenced to this nightmare and who has lost both parents or is unwanted by its parents. Give that child your family name. That you can do even with a woman with her tubes tied, but she has to be a woman who is also going to co-parent with you as an equal. I think that was the real issue with your ex. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/12/2008 5:08:04 PM | I can sympathise with you on a number of issues here. Been through an experience not too far from yours.
Taking on another man´s ex-wife and offspring (especially if the offspring are young), you are on many occasions deep down going to feel third best in the whole set up. And this is whilst you are paying the bulk of the bills, running around like a headless chicken trying to be a father figure, and the "other man´s" children are tearing up your house without so much as a "now! now!" from you unless you want the wrath of the mother.
To the woman, you are without doubt going to be second best to the children. This is automatic and to be expected. And in your situation, you are often going to feel third best to her ex-husband(the father of her kids), because she had children with him, but doesn´t want them with you. To be comfortable in this position, takes an incredible amount of patience, durability, and unconditional love on your part. It doesn´t necessarily follow that it will automatically be reciprocated.
Yours is a very sorry tale. And I hope you will manage to get over it in due course. The only healer, no matter what people say, is the passing of time. It WILL become easier as your recently removed life gradually fades. This is a certainty.
Take care. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/12/2008 7:30:10 PM |
Men in their 30's with no children
Hmmm, maybe women didn't find them attractive enough? You know in every species there are those individuals that are gentically red flaged to not continue the gene pool.
Just a thought? | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/13/2008 1:44:19 AM | | I think it is very common for people in their 30's to not have kids. However, Id definately want em before 40, but that depends on if I meet the right woman or not I guess. It isn't always in a persons control. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/13/2008 6:11:57 AM | Don't feel guilty, tootuncommon. You're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't.
If you stayed with her then there'd be people who would be saying you're selfish for not having kids.
There'll always be some people who will critisise your lifestyle no matter what you do, so don't listen to them and just do what you feel is best. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/13/2008 9:20:23 AM | | 40 and no kids and don't want any. Problem is finding someone else that is in the same boat. I think more people should take a good hard look at themselves and their situation before having kids. Seems to me many have kids just because they are 'suppose to', not because they want childern or can even efford to have them. | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/13/2008 9:21:16 AM | ....I'm alone with my thoughts of why I ended it with her....I now want kids. I feel guilty for ending my marriage for the want of children...
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Well, for the average Joe, I feel for you. I became a father at 35. You are still "fairly" young (hek, you aren't 58 at posting this). The answer to your question is "Two Fold", ie, a generic or living question, and then the specifics of your case (no I"m not a Dr, I just look like one)....in no particular order:
1. For now, focus on BECOMING SUPERMAN! This would not be a time to drink, buy an ATV, have looser friends, nor spend $1000 on Xbox360 and games....
2. This is the time to improve your physical, spiritual, and mental health. VIGOROUS EXERCISE 3X PER WEEK is a great antidepressant and chick magnet (see Consumer Reports, 2002 vol.?)
3. Start cultivating yourself TO BE A GREAT HUSBAND AND FATHER. Read books about relationships, dating, courtship, marriage, and father hood. Don't go home after work at the auto shop, don't crack a beer, and don't watch stupid TV shows.
4. SAVE MONEY....babies and their mommas are $$$. Can you stash $3000 in savings (plus your retirement accts) BEFORE you meet a woman? ITS HARD WORK, ARE YOU WORTH IT?
5. (see 3). Make your home and you look good. Maybe fix the yard (get rid of the junk and just keep one "collector car"), borrow a carpet and upholstery shampooer , wash and paint walls, GROW A GARDEN and houseplants (if you have 3 big stinky dogs, don't get anymore).
6. Learn to be SPIRITUAL AND HUMBLE, and or religious. So you can deal with the nutcase broad (and I mean that in a nice way) you get hot for.
7. There is no shortage of people in the world, HAVE ONE OR TWO KIDS AT MOST, and maybe....FIND A GAL WITH A COUPLE YOUNGINS..instant family, extra income there, and GET ALONG WITH THE -EX (all of them). | |
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| Men in their 30's with no children
Posted: 4/13/2008 2:37:39 PM | Just a followup on this ordeal. Now just to clear thr air, i dont want kids "just to carry on the family name", I guess its just that I see my sister's kids and how sucessful she has been in raising them and I say to myself,"I want a piece of that action" not because of jealosy although there is a little envy there. I need to be fulfilled and I wont be totally fulfilled unless I become a father. I mean,this is going to sound corny but I cry when I hear the first cries of a newborn while watching a birth on tv! But thats the way Iam. My desire to be a Father is so strong, it is the only thing that I want more than life itself. Now don't get me wrong I have nothing against adoption, and I commend those who do but I dont know if I could be a good candidate for adoption because in the back of my mind there is always going to be the voice that says "this child at one time was not yours" and to me personally that is not fair to the child.
I guess I'll just end up playing the waiting game and see how it plays out. Thanks for your comments guys. Clay | |
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